Google Product Sense: Running Office Coffee and Snack Stations With Lower Attendance
Company: Google
Role: Product Manager
Category: Product Design & Strategy
Difficulty: medium
Interview Round: Other
Google's offices have "Corner Cafes": small self-serve spots around the building that hold coffee and snacks for employees. Fewer employees now come into the offices than before. Treat the cafes as a product you own and explain how you would manage them under this lower attendance: what you would aim for, what you would change, and how you would know the changes are working.
```hint Look beneath the average
A lower average headcount can hide large swings by weekday and by floor. Think about which signals could tell you ahead of time how many people will be near each cafe on a given day, before you decide what to stock or where.
```
### Clarifying Questions
- How far has attendance fallen, and is it low every day or concentrated on certain weekdays and in certain buildings or floors?
- What matters most here: reducing cost and food waste, keeping a perk employees value, or using the cafes to make coming into the office more attractive?
- Are we managing the cafes on one floor, in one building, or across every office, and are they stocked by an internal facilities team or under a vendor contract?
- Can individual cafes be closed or consolidated, or is every floor expected to keep its own?
### What a Strong Answer Covers
- A clear goal for the cafes that balances employee experience against cost and waste, given their role in a company that wants people in the office.
- The groups who use or run the cafes and how their needs differ by day, time and location.
- Concrete levers matched to lower, more variable demand: forecasting from attendance signals, assortment and stock levels, which cafes stay open, and restocking operations.
- Success metrics for waste, cost and availability, with guardrails on employee satisfaction and accessibility.
- How changes would be piloted and communicated so employees do not read them as a quiet cut to a valued perk.
### Follow-up Questions
- Attendance turns out to be heavy midweek and very light on Mondays and Fridays. How does your plan change from day to day?
- Leadership asks for a large cut to cafe spending. Which changes would you make first, and how would you protect what employees value most?
- How would you find out whether the cafes have any effect on how often people choose to come into the office?
Overview: A Google product sense question about managing the office coffee and snack cafes now that fewer employees come in. It tests setting a goal for an employee perk, forecasting demand from attendance, stocking and consolidation trade-offs, and metrics that balance waste and cost against employee satisfaction.